This day, last year.

I don't know which venue to post this on. I've stopped writing my beer blog due to the amount of time I need to spend on work, school, and school work. But I don't want to start a new blog or revive an old one either, since I'll probably only write something like this once a year. Nevertheless, here goes.

March 25th, 2012.

This time last year, I was home. Not because of some vacation, wedding, or anniversary. I was home because laid up in a hospital bed in Cardinal Santos Medical Center fighting his final battle was the greatest man I have ever known, my mother's loving husband and friend, the father to her children, my father. He commended his spirit to our Heavenly Father that day, on the Feast of the Annunciation. He had such great devotion to our Holy Mother, no one could have picked a better day for him to return Home. But after the dust settled, after the doctors and nurses came in to pronounce my father dead, I couldn't help but think that though I had assured my father that we would all be fine, I wasn't ready for him to leave. I don't think any of us really were. He was in pain, his senses were failing, and there was very little any of us could have done to prolong his life, but all I could wish for was for him to wake up, stand up, and take my hand like one would a child's. I wanted to be a newborn in his arms, a toddler at his feet, a child by his side once more. Despite all the time I was able to spend with him before his final breath and all the talks we had about what to except and what to do upon his departure, I was still unequivocally unprepared for him leaving.

At the beginning, with my mother, my siblings and the rest of my family, we mourned the loss of my father. Sure, we celebrated his life, his time with us, and all the good lessons he imparted on us. But that too, is mourning. Then when I left home and came back to the United States, I felt so alone. I didn't have my mother to console me, or for me to console her. I didn't have my brothers and sisters to share drinks with over stories of my father. So it seemed that I kept myself busy, as to push the sadness away. It seemed to have kept me from thinking of my father and breaking down constantly. It seemed like a good idea at first. But eventually, I lost myself. I've looked back in to the year that has passed and I realized that I have not been the best version of myself. My father was not in my daily life. To add insult to injury, it was by my own doing. I thought of him once in a while, and made sure he was in my prayers at night, but he wasn't in everything I did. And because of that, I wasn't the best I could have been. I realized recently that, though it hurts for me to think of my father constantly, and the fact that I can't hug him, kiss him, or playfully rub his rotund belly, if I want to be the best version of myself at all times, I have to keep him constantly in all that I do. Much like how St. Josemaria Escriva encourages us to find the sanctity in daily life, I believe that I must find my father in all that I do. If I do that, though I wasn't prepared when my father left, at least I'll follow through and will finally be fine about him going Home.